For this featured conversation, Lauren Calvin Cooke speaks to us about how to utilize John’s Gospel for spiritual formation. The reason we have Scripture is that through our encounters with it, God shapes us.
Conversation Highlights
- The richness of John’s images, and how a slower approach to John can be rewarding
- How glory and glorification in John show us what it looks like to progress in the spiritual life
- A deeper understanding of how Truth works in John
- How the characters in John provide us with models for our faith journey
About Lauren Calvin Cooke
Lauren holds a B.A. in Theology and Ministry from Lipscomb University with a concentration in Youth Ministry; M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary; and is currently pursuing Ph.D. in Religious Education at Emory University, focusing on Youth Ministry.
Lauren has a blog where she provides wonderful suggestions for healthy youth ministry practices. Here’s one of my favorite posts of hers.
Recommended Resources
Here are a few items recommended by Lauren, with her comments.
- Jean Vanier, Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus through the Gospel of John. This is an excellent book that provides some commentary as well as meditations on the whole Gospel.
- Parker Palmer, To Know As We Are Known. This is a book on the spirituality of education I reference in talking about relational knowledge.
- Raymond Brown, The Gospel of John. This is an old but a good commentary in the Anchor Bible series.
- Feasting on the Gospels is also a good, accessible commentary with the perspectives of multiple authors.
